Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gave an interview Wednesday evening on Kan 11's "Seven with Ayala Hasson," responding for the first time in his own voice to the libel suit filed against him by former Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar. Bar accused Netanyahu of spreading a blood libel claiming he knew about the October 7 massacre, refrained from warning, and even prevented the transfer of information, attaching to his suit a detailed timeline of warnings issued in the months before the disaster.
In response, Netanyahu rejected the accusations and claimed the intelligence assessments he received before the failure did not include a focused warning regarding the Gaza Strip. Netanyahu stated that "when they talked about it, it was around the crisis of the judicial reform, and they kept wanting to say there was a danger of escalation sometimes or of civil war, between us, or war on other fronts, but they always excluded one arena: Gaza."
During the interview, the prime minister was asked about his close adviser Yonatan Urich's ties with Qatar, and clarified that he was not privy to the matter and that Urich was not exposed to classified information. Netanyahu answered with a single word: "Nothing," adding that Yonatan Urich was not present at any security meeting. "He was not briefed on security matters, because he had no security information whatsoever; he was outside the door."
When asked why he did not clarify the matter with the adviser himself, he claimed his lawyers instructed him to refrain from doing so due to legal constraints. Netanyahu attacked the very investigation into Urich and claimed that "there was a judge who said there is nothing security-related here," adding that they did him "a terrible injustice" and that it is "all political and a political hunt," exactly like the trial being conducted against him.
Addressing the issue of establishing a commission of inquiry into the events of October 7, Netanyahu rejected the possibility of establishing a government inquiry commission out of an understanding that part of the public would reject it outright. At the same time, Netanyahu also ruled out establishing a state commission of inquiry, claiming it is "everything except state."
Netanyahu justified his opposition by saying that in practice it is a commission led by the judicial system headed by Supreme Court President Yitzhak Amit, "who has clear political views." Netanyahu noted that the proper model in his view is the one implemented in the United States after the September 11 attacks, a bipartisan commission half composed of coalition representatives and half of opposition representatives, but noted that the opposition did not agree to this proposal.
In the final part of the interview, the prime minister addressed his criminal trial and his testimony in court, defining these days as a decisive moment and closing of a circle. He accused that there were criminal offenses on the side of the prosecution and the police, defining the entire proceeding as a political hunt aimed at bringing down a strong prime minister from the right.
When asked about the involvement of former Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit, whom he previously appointed to the position, Netanyahu claimed that "we did not know how much he was held and to this day we do not know the whole story there," claiming that Mandelblit signed the indictment with a scanned signature without reading it.
To Hasson's direct question whether he believes they "framed" him with a case, Netanyahu answered decisively that he does not "think" so, rather he "knows" so, adding that it involves "crude stitching that is unraveling and everyone sees it."
